Doctoral Dissertation Research: A Systematic Investigation of the Spanish Subjunctive

众所周知，罗曼语家族在两种语言“语气”——虚拟语气和指示语气——之间有着富有成效的对比。虚拟选择从句是指说话人表达愿望、要求、怀疑、情感、可能性、目的或原因的从句。根据传统语法，西班牙语作为一种罗曼语，也遵守这些限制。然而，与预期相反，说西班牙语的人在许多“虚拟语气要求”的环境中选择指示性。许多用来描述情绪选择的框架只关注于规范正确的选择模式。因此，传统语义学理论没有触及虚拟语气从句中指示语的意外使用。因此，本论文的研究项目旨在建立一种语义-语用的情绪解释，可以解释非规定性的情绪变化。然而，在建立这样一个解释之前，目前的项目试图确认这种差异存在的程度，以及存在这种差异的方言。通过这种方式，对西班牙语情绪系统的更全面的描述将成为可能，该系统可以解释方言特有的和非规定性的变化。这将有助于更好地理解西班牙语，这是美国第二大常用语言，语料库研究将进行，以获得在八种传统的虚拟语气要求语境中自然发生的语气使用例子。获得的项目将被纳入可接受性判断任务（AJT）。目的是测试特定情境如何影响参与者对两种情绪的可接受性。ajt和后续访谈的结果将为在不应该发生的环境中调节情绪变化的语义-语用因素提供更深入的见解。参与实验的参与者将来自不同的西班牙方言。由于没有对西班牙语进行系统的、广泛的研究，本项目的数据将扩展现有的知识体系。此外，从理论角度来看，这样的研究将有助于填补与情绪非规定性使用相关的研究空白。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Romance language family is known to have a productive contrast between two verbal 'moods', the subjunctive and the indicative. Subjunctive-selecting clauses are those in which a speaker expresses a desire, demand, doubt, emotion, possibility, purpose, or cause. According to traditional grammar, Spanish, being a Romance language, also adheres to these restrictions. However, contrary to what is expected, Spanish-speakers select the indicative in many 'subjunctive-requiring' environments. Many frameworks used to describe the choice of mood focus exclusively on prescriptively correct patterns of selection. As a result, the unexpected use of indicative in subjunctive clauses is left untouched by traditional semantic theory. This dissertation research project, thus, aims to develop a semanto-pragmatic account of mood that can explain mood variation that is non-prescriptive. However, prior to developing such an account, the current project seeks to confirm the extent to which this variability exists, as well as the dialects in which it is present. In this way, a more comprehensive description of the Spanish mood system that accounts for both dialect-specific and non-prescriptive variability will become available. This will lead to a better understanding of Spanish, the second most common language spoken in the U.S.A corpus study will be carried out in order to obtain naturally-occurring examples of mood use in the eight traditionally subjunctive-requiring contexts. The items obtained will be adapted for inclusion in an Acceptability Judgment Task (AJT). The objective is to test how specific contexts affect participant views on the acceptability of either mood. Results from the AJTs and follow-up interviews will provide greater insight into the semanto-pragmatic factors conditioning mood variation in environments in which it is not supposed to occur. The participants forming part of the experiment will come from various Spanish dialects. Since no systematic, widespread study of Spanish has been carried out, data from this project will expand on the body of knowledge that currently exists. Additionally, in terms of a theoretical standpoint, such an investigation will help to fill the research gaps related to non-prescriptive uses of mood.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.